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For Brazil’s Sake, I Hope They Lose In The World Cup

Why root for a Brazilian loss? Because if they win, the cries of the poor and desperate in Brazil will be drowned out by the cheers of the soccer-crazed fans who could actually afford to get inside the stadium….

Do we care about this: Germany devastates Brazil, 7-1, in World Cup semifinal. Nope! But it matters to Haiti’s poor and exploited that Brazil commands the UN occupational troops acting as a colonial army for the United States and that amongst all the colonial army’s travesty against un-armed Haiti, it’s reported that: Haitian quake survivors were used as slave labor in building of World Cup stadium in Brazil.

Why: "they may point to the 15,000 displaced people in Rio alone. Or the $11.5 billion of expenses — $3.6 billion of which are taxpayer dollars — on this World Cup, making it the most expensive ever. They might even add that four of the 12 stadiums that $11.5 billion was spent on weren’t even required by FIFA.

You might expect a Brazilian to be wishing for goals and assists, but all the more likely, a Brazilian will explain how they wish that money went to the bullet train in Sao Paulo, or to the poor, or to education, or to improving the airports, which are currently using tents as terminals.

"I will cheer for Brazil as always, but for the first time I don’t want them to win," Jose Erivaldo Costa, a hotel worker from Rio de Janeiro, told Christina Lamb of the Sunday Times this month. "If we win the government will use it as an opportunity to say what a success it has been and to mask all our problems."

This neglect has led to groups like Sao Paulo’s People’s Committee of the Cup, whose members came together three years ago to fight the injustices that would come with the event.

"The cup affects various populations, like the mobile vendors who can’t go near the stadiums or near Fan Fest," Vanesa Dos Santos, another organizer, told the International Business Times. "It affects the prostitutes, many of them children, who will be taken advantage of during the Cup."

Inside these billion dollar stadiums are resources Brazil’s people need, not their footballers; solar power technology and thousands of workers who could be constructing public facilities, to name just two. Instead, money like the $280 million invested into Corinthians’ stadium will never be seen by the Brazilian people. That’s money for grass and retractable seats and scoreboards and massive television screens. Money that could be distributed to the young or the poor in a country that boasts the thirteenth worst economic inequality on the planet.

"The paradox of education is precisely this; that as one begins to become conscious one begins to examine the society in which he is being educated."
- James Baldwin
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